'Compelled by Reason': On Insularity, Openness, and the Internet

With God's help

2008

Introduction

It is currently accepted in the religious Torah world that the Internet does more harm than good. Here I would like to focus on a positive aspect of the use of the Internet, and I mean the intellectual forums, and especially the forum 'Stop Here, Think' (hereinafter: SHT).

From the following remarks I will try to clarify the significance of this forum, especially in relation to the Haredi world, and I will describe this mainly through several of my experiences there. I present these remarks here in order to offer another angle on the discussion of the harms of insularity in the Haredi world and more generally, and to point to the plainly positive value found in this aspect of the Internet. Because of limited space, however, I will focus more on description and reporting, and less on analysis.

I will begin with an important clarification. Everything said here is a generalization. At times I describe some phenomenon as though it characterizes the forum's participants, when in fact it applies only to a certain group among them. My purpose here is not to provide a scientific description, but to describe an atmosphere in general terms. It should also be known that the main descriptions relate to the Haredi participants in the forum, and at least in recent years it has been quite clear that they are a minority.

SHT[1]

The forum was founded about seven years ago by a group of Haredi kollel scholars, most of them students of Rabbi Gedaliah Nadel of blessed memory (from whom I too, in my small way, was privileged to hear a little). Later many more members joined, mainly men, though there are also women. Some are Haredi (Hasidic and Lithuanian), some secular, some former religious Jews, some Religious Zionist, and even Reform (at least two Reform women rabbis participate regularly). There are occasional participants, but most are regulars. The participants' occupations and education are quite diverse. Some are kollel scholars and yeshiva students, and some work in the professions (university lecturers, lawyers, judges, etc.). There are also people who hold positions in Torah institutions. Most participants are fairly young, but there are older ones as well (even beyond retirement).

The forum set itself the goal of clarifying problems in the worlds of Torah and Judaism, Jewish law and philosophy, with complete openness and without any commitment to prior assumptions. Any position and any opinion may be raised, however extreme or heretical it may be, but it must be reasoned, and one must speak respectfully about every person, position, or topic, without slander and without gossip (in cases of blatant excess, the posts are deleted by the administrators. This should be appreciated all the more against the background of the great anger and bitterness many there feel toward the society in which they live). In the terminology current there, the spirit of 'the angel Sekhliel' stands in the background of the discussions. For this reason political topics are forbidden there, unless one focuses on their conceptual and principled aspects, and in no way on political practice or on the names of specific individuals.

This openness, which leads to the airing of quite a number of positions that are problematic from a Torah perspective, arouses considerable criticism of the forum and its participants (beyond the very fact that they browse the Internet) within Haredi society. On the 'B'Hadrei Haredim' forum (which is less concerned with intellectual clarification and more with Haredi news and gossip), this forum is referred to as 'the forum whose name must not be mentioned' (because of its 'heretical' character). On the other hand, by way of jest and mockery, SHT participants call that forum 'the forum whose name may be mentioned.' That other forum evokes deep distaste among some SHT participants (because of its tendentiousness and lack of openness, and even more because of the low and gossipy level that usually characterizes it).

Participation in the forum creates very interesting connections and fascinating acquaintances. At an event held by one of the forum members (a Haredi kollel scholar pursuing a doctorate at a university), I sat at the table with a well-known international lawyer (from a Haredi background) and with a young kollel scholar wearing the striped robe of Toldot Aharon (later another Haredi communal activist from among the forum-goers joined us). The topics of conversation were philosophy and sociology, as well as jokes and various mundane matters. The common language flowed freely, and I felt as though we all belonged to the same group and were speaking a shared language. At another meeting, held in my home, two Reform women rabbis took part, together with several knitted-kippah wearers, kollel scholars and working people, as well as Haredi kollel scholars. The relations were excellent, and different opinions were exchanged in a spirit of willingness to listen to everyone (certainly without giving up one's positions, but with willingness to listen and learn from everyone, and certainly without the usual stereotypes).

I will conclude this section with a description of a meeting of three forum participants, held in the apartment of a Lithuanian kollel scholar in Jerusalem. This is how one of the participants (a Reform woman rabbi) described it: We stood at the entrance of the shared building – a woman in jeans (nothing immodest, heaven forbid), a Lithuanian in suit and hat, and a Toldot Aharon Hasid with the white-and-gold robe and shtreimel fur hat (it was Saturday night), smoking and laughing. From the balconies of the building opposite, stunned children peeked out until their father came and chased them back into the house. I did not understand the point at all; I only grasped that it was surreal. Afterwards So-and-so (=the host) told us that he was sure everyone knew from which apartment we had come out and that he had no problem with it (though I felt guilty).

The Beginning, and a First Meeting

My acquaintance with the forum began following a phone call I received from one of the participants, who told me that my book, 'Two Wagons and a Hot-Air Balloon,' had come up for discussion on the forum. He invited me to participate, and about three years ago, after I had also read a newspaper article (in Haaretz) about Rabbi Gedaliah Nadel and the students of his who founded the forum, I began visiting and participating in the discussions.

I should note that participation in the forum takes place through 'nicknames,' that is, pseudonyms, and not under one's real name. This phenomenon exists in all Internet forums, but in Haredi forums it is observed much more strictly, out of fear of 'spies' trying to locate and identify the participants, in order to threaten them and prevent them from taking part in the forum, or to harass them in the 'real' world (as distinct from the virtual one). It is important to emphasize that these nicknames prevent participants from identifying their fellow participants, and at times even a man may hide behind a woman's nickname, or an Orthodox Jew under the cover of a Reform identity, or vice versa. There is no way (at least for me, as an Internet layman) to discover the truth behind these disguises, but in my experience it is usually difficult to hide behind a nickname that differs substantially from the real person. In all the cases where I came to know the people behind the nicknames, there was no essential difference between the way they appeared under the nickname and the real person.

From the outset I appeared there under my real name (simply because I felt no need to hide, nor any threat), and I found that this also caused the participants to trust me and to speak with me more freely, and at times also to identify themselves to me by their real names and even to meet me. Some of them had heard of me because of my books and because of my yeshiva past in Bnei Brak, and knowing my name reassured them that I was not some hostile 'spy.'

This freer communication, of course, does not take place in the public channels where the discussions are conducted. It takes place only in personal channels of communication, such as private message boxes, which exist alongside the public channel, or by telephone or ordinary email. These message boxes play a very important role in enabling freer communication among the participants, though many of them fear that even these channels are not immune to intrusion by hostile 'spies.' I do not know how well founded these fears are, and to the best of my estimation some of the participants' concerns are fairly exaggerated, though it is hard to judge them for this. Several of them told me that they had suffered quite a bit as a result of such exposures (up to and including actual physical violence, not to mention loss of livelihood, or of study in a kollel, or of places for their children in cheder schools, and certainly marriage prospects).

A short time after I began, I was invited through the personal channel, together with several other participants, to take part in a clandestine meeting with a group of forum participants, in which a rabbi who was accepted by some of them as an important thinker and guide was also supposed to take part (only later did I understand that this meeting was meant to serve as a kind of confrontation, or dialogue, between him and me, in the presence of several of his students. And perhaps also for the sake of our becoming acquainted). As noted, the invitation was sent through the private message box to several participants who had been checked and found not to be hostile. After exchanges of messages through private channels, the date and time were agreed upon, and the organizer informed us that the location of the meeting would be sent only on the last evening (for fear of the evil eye and exposure). And indeed, on the last night a concluding message was sent with the address where the meeting would be held. The address included a street and house number in Bnei Brak, and nothing more.

When I arrived at the meeting, I found the building and went up to the floor indicated in the aforementioned message. I assumed that when I arrived the door would be open, or there would be a sign directing me to the place. But I reached the designated floor and found several closed doors, with names none of which was familiar to me. I did not know on which door to knock, or what to ask (for the organizer's real name was not known to me). Even as an Internet novice, it was clear to me that there was no possibility of knocking on a door and asking where the SHT gathering was taking place, for that would be tantamount to causing certain harm to the organizer and the participants. I stood there at a loss and did not know what to do. Suddenly I saw a kollel scholar arrive and knock on one of the doors, and I dared hint to him whether he knew where 'it' was taking place. When he did not ask me for further clarification, I understood that we were headed to the same place, and I entered after him.

Once I entered, they invited me to sit down, and I immediately turned to the participants and asked them who they were. I expected each of them to introduce his 'nickname' together with his real name and identity, so that we could become acquainted and converse. To my surprise there was some chuckling and embarrassment, and very quickly it became clear to me that once again I had misunderstood the rules of the game. I learned that even in meetings in the 'real' world there is no identification by real name, and everyone addresses the others through their 'nickname' handles.

At first this was awkward and very artificial, but very quickly I became accustomed to it, and I tried to understand why they lived in such fear. When I asked, the organizer told me that once, after some of the views he had expressed on the forum were heard, people attacked him and harassed him and his family even on the physical level. I should note that some of the founders of the forum and several of its most important participants are in no way willing to identify themselves to me, despite acquaintance and intimate conversations (virtual ones), and without any real fear that I would reveal their identity, simply out of fear of the evil eye and of the bird of the heavens that may carry the sound.

As the conversation there continued, it became clear to me that most of the participants knew one another in the real world as well (and not only in the virtual forum), yet even among themselves communication continued to take place through their 'nickname' handles.

'Compelled by Reason'

In the conversation at that meeting, as in the forum generally, I encountered a fairly frightened group in no simple distress. These are very intelligent people, some of them genuine Torah scholars, kollel scholars of the very highest caliber, thoroughly versed in the Talmud and in halakhic literature, and yet at least some of them hold varied and divergent views. This is certainly not a fringe phenomenon, nor are these 'shababniks' (Haredi dropouts), as Haredi rebels of the past would have been defined. These are people from the mainstream, and some of them even take part in teaching and in public writing within the Haredi world.

Conversations that clarify personal, intellectual, and spiritual difficulties and problems do not exist in their actual world (as distinct from the virtual one). They have no one with whom to speak, and they cannot expose their doubts and difficulties. And again, these are not the distresses of a dropout, but questions of good, upright Jews with spiritual aspirations, touching on the service of God, faith, worldview, and the like.

As a result of this distress, many of the participants define themselves as 'Compelled by Reason.' This may sound pathetic, but they insist that it is no exaggeration and that it is a faithful description of their condition. They argue that the Haredi world is unwilling to allow any genuine thinking whatsoever (apart from questions about the plain meaning of Ketzot HaHoshen), and that anyone who has additional questions, of other kinds, is supposed either to suppress them or to deal with them underground, alone with himself. At least on the experiential and consciousness level, the association with the reign of terror of the KGB, or the Inquisition, is not so far from reality.

What Is 'Kedushit'

Within the conversation that took place there (and also on the forum), there was frequent reference to a community/city called 'Kedushit.' At first I did not understand what was being discussed, but it became clear to me that this was an ideal city representing the aspirations of many of the participants in the forum and at the meeting. In that city, open discussions would take place, there would be genuine reverence for Heaven and not the counterfeit sort found in the ordinary Haredi world (I say this in light of their own descriptions, without expressing my own view at the moment), and a person would be accepted as he is. In 'Kedushit' they would be careful about obligations between one person and another no less than about obligations between human beings and God, and every opinion and every person holding an opinion would be respected as is proper. There would be no 'Compelled by Reason' there, because people could, and indeed would be expected to, act in accordance with their understanding, even if that were not necessarily the 'correct' path. There would be study halls there that engaged in Torah in its broad sense (a sense that of course varies among the participants. Some want engagement with general philosophy, and some speak of psychology or other fields of knowledge). The sources of knowledge would of course be far broader than the Torah text and Rashi. The idea is to draw knowledge from all scientific and general sources, and at times, where necessary, to 'convert' that knowledge. And above all, most of the people of 'Kedushit' would study and become educated, and at the same time also work for their livelihood.

According to my impression, the newspaper in Kedushit would apparently not deal with politics (apparently there would be no politicians there at all), but only with conceptual inquiries concerning God and the human being, history and its meaning, the principles of faith, various fields of knowledge, and the like. I am not even sure that the city is intended only for believers (the concepts of belief are very flexible in that society). The conditions for admission concern method and approach more than a person's specific worldview.

This description may sound somewhat childish to the reader, but the people there are certainly aware of that. It is a mode of discourse whose purpose is to describe longings and aspirations, though many times there is also a desire to bring things down to practical implementation. In their view this is no more childish than Haredi society as it actually exists, which is also not practical, also detached from actual reality, lives on disconnected utopias and slogans, and ignores the serious problems within it. In their opinion, these are utopias, some of them distorted and mistaken, and at times even cruel and immoral.

Ideological Lines: Some Generalizations

Within an important group on the forum (mainly among the founders), there is complete acceptance of scientific findings and academic claims (at least with respect to facts), to the point of undermining the principles of faith. Others sharply criticize some academic approaches, but not because they are 'heretical'; rather because they too are captive to unjustified assumptions. More generally, accepting something merely because of the identity of the one who said it (an ad hominem move) is one of the grave 'sins' in these circles. There is opposition to the academic approach that tends to classify everything and to tell someone, 'You are speaking like Kant,' or 'you are following Freud,' and the like. Ideas are supposed to be discussed on their own merits, for fear that they will be judged by the person speaking rather than by the content of what is said.

Many core beliefs are turned into allegory in order to fit what people believe. This includes foundational principles such as Torah from Sinai, the nature of God (among some of them a pantheistic view prevails, in varying shades, according to which God is called 'Being,' because He is identical with the totality of existence), the figure and reality of the patriarchs of the nation, and the like. The philosophical framework of a central group among the founders of the forum is a combination of objectivism (belief in an absolute truth accessible to us), mixed with existentialist subjectivity (truth is what I experience in an immediate way, and therefore it is not open to dispute).

The question that naturally arises here is the one many philosophers raised against Kant: on what basis does he assume that his subjective experiences are identical in all human beings (and thereby become objective)? The details of this doctrine are intricate and elaborate, and I myself am not sufficiently versed in them, but my purpose here is only to give the reader a sense of the atmosphere prevailing there.

I myself once raised there a unique thread (= a discussion thread devoted to a given topic) regarding the existence of demons, angels, and various spiritual entities. The basic approach of almost all the participants was a sweeping denial of this possibility. The same was true of threads dealing with various supernatural phenomena. Rationalism (which is not necessarily rationality, as I wrote there more than once) reigns supreme, and sources that imply otherwise are rejected out of hand, or interpreted in various creative ways (through subjective experiences, or the use of popular language, and in Rabbi Gedaliah Nadel's manner). To be sure, the attitude toward the Sages is usually respectful, and there is a commitment (not always absolute) to what emerges from their words. A considerable portion of the participants have no doubt that the Sages could err, certainly regarding reality and science, but perhaps also in the interpretation of the Torah.

Myth-busting is a common occupation on the forum: whether stories and historical descriptions, or rules of Jewish law that have no real basis (especially if some relate to them as fixed laws from Sinai, and there are quite a few such cases even among Torah scholars), or sayings whose source is external, or linguistic expressions whose meaning has changed, and all the other Haredi and religious dogmas and conventions. To be sure, unlike what occurs in other forums, here this is usually done while presenting reasons and grounding the claims in sources.

The collective thinking, in their special language, yields a coherent and detailed doctrine that answers all these questions (though, in my opinion, some of the answers I received are unsatisfactory), and everyone knows how to distinguish among the various nuances. They have already thought about almost everything, since they deal with it a great deal, together and separately. This is a living, vibrant study hall, which, as far as I know, also exists in the real world (although I have no practical part in it, since I do not accept its philosophical assumptions).

A Spinozist discourse is developing there (of this they are aware), and a Taoist one as well (this identification is mine, and I have already received agreement about it from members of those groups), with a new terminology understood only by the participants in this discourse. I should note that all this mainly characterizes a group among the founders of the forum, and today within the forum itself this discourse has almost entirely disappeared. The founding group can no longer continue conducting the discussions in esoteric terminology and discourse, and therefore many of them have thinned out their participation in the forum, and some have left entirely. They continue their study and discussions in meetings of their own, physical and virtual.

I should note that despite the principled openness, since matters on the philosophical plane have already been worked out to the finest detail and they have already thought about everything, my feeling is that there is no willingness there to accept criticism or change anything in the discourse or in the principles that have crystallized. Regarding interpretation of certain topics there certainly is such willingness, and one can even find among them very interesting proposals for understanding laws that in ordinary yeshiva eyes appear as inscrutable scriptural decrees without reason (in Rabbi Gedaliah Nadel's manner, for those who know it).

Autodidacticism and Its Price

At that meeting described above, and in others as well (as also in the forum itself), I met several autodidacts who had studied and mastered difficult philosophical material, on a most impressive scale (one of them even wrote a full and detailed book on a philosophical topic, in which he surveys the history of philosophy in a very impressive way, at least from the angle discussed in the book). I found there an impressive intellectual curiosity, hard to compare with what I know in places where philosophy is not underground (such as the Religious Zionist or secular world). On the other hand, the fact that everything is done underground, at most within a closed group that all comes from the same place, leads them to develop a language of their own and principles of analysis and formulation, some of which in my opinion are not yet mature. The criticism of people more skilled in dealing with such sources and fields of knowledge is sorely lacking. They have no lecturers or teachers such as exist in yeshivot, nor research supervisors as in the academic world, and as a result some of them reach extreme and unbalanced conclusions, as one can sometimes find among adolescents who encounter philosophical questions on their own. One should add to this the fact that these are extreme rationalists, one of whose principles of faith is that one should conduct oneself in accordance with one's understanding and with the conclusion reached through study of the issue, and from this it will be understood that their way of life itself expresses these innovative approaches.[2]

It is worth noting that in the meetings in which I participated it became clear to me that in most cases these were very young people, and at times the surprise was very great. A person whose manner of discourse on the forum gives the impression that he is full of years and experience turns out to be a young man (usually a very intelligent one). Even the most dominant figures are generally of surprisingly young age.

The internal discourse of this group is based on Ayn Rand (Rand has always been popular among rebellious young people, especially rationalist rebels, and even more so among those unwilling to accept guidance and oversight and captivated by the romantic-rationalist charm of her views, which in my opinion is shallow and immature).

At this point I will add that in recent years it has become clear to me from many sources that the elite Haredi yeshivot are full of various books circulating under the tables. This is not pornography, but books of philosophy and thought regarded as outside the camp (among them my own books as well, and I am repeatedly surprised to discover how many people have encountered them, despite the fact that this is 'forbidden,' and whoever is caught with such books may pay a price). The students exchange information about various libraries (not in Bnei Brak, of course) in which one can find this or that book. The phenomenon of the Volozhin 'undergrounds' is returning (or perhaps it never disappeared?!), and on a fairly broad scale. From what different friends describe to me, this is a very widespread phenomenon, and naturally it characterizes specifically the intellectual-scholarly elite and the important yeshivot.

I should note that I met some of these people in lessons (mainly on Torah subjects) that I gave to young men and kollel scholars in Bnei Brak, which were also conducted almost underground (not literally), and after some time I even heard of at least two cases of young men who, because of their participation in these lessons, were forced to leave the yeshiva in which they studied. Others were forbidden to participate, and so they stopped coming. Forum members also expressed interest in these lessons, but in the end did not come for fear of exposure and identification. My impression is that this is a fairly broad phenomenon, and certainly not only on the margins.

Exposure: The Price of Rebellion

From the beginning of my participation in the forum I repeatedly asked these people how they thought they would establish 'Kedushit.' If each person is hiding behind his 'nickname,' and no one is willing to pay the price of exposure, then in the real world such a city will never arise. One cannot bring about change without paying prices. There are no instant revolutions, I repeatedly told them. Altogether the group numbers quite a few people (I am speaking of at least several hundred, in my estimation, though certainly not all of them participate in the forum), and if they were willing to expose themselves and come out into the open, this could already have been a respectable 'court.'

The answers were that I was indeed right, but on the personal level it is very difficult to demand that they pay this price. Haredi society has built itself in such a way that it traps its members within it, so that it is almost impossible to rebel against part of it and at the same time remain within it. Of course one can cast off the yoke and leave, but these are people for whom the service of God stands at the center of their world and matters greatly to them. Such exposure means, for them, severance from the family and the loss of the possibility of finding a match outside this group (which hardly includes women, while on the other hand the people are mostly young, many of them unmarried).

A few months ago there was an attempt (the first, to the best of my knowledge) to gather publicly a large group of such people, in order to establish in the 'real' world an identifiable group. They unsuccessfully sought rabbinic leadership that would stand at their head and lend them legitimacy (mainly regarding the legitimacy of working for a living, and less with respect to the philosophical questions). One of the organizers of the gathering told me that his father (who is an important Haredi rabbi) threatened him that if he continued, relations between them would be cut off and he would mourn him as though he were dead. The information reached the father's ears through Haredi spies, who used this method in order to influence the son to abandon his initiative. Such attempts constantly suffer harassment, and thus these initiatives are torpedoed while still in their infancy.

'It's All Sociology'

When I ask them in what sense they define themselves as Haredi—a question that arises there quite often (in the past they dealt there a good deal with Haredi identity and its definitions, and today this exists more in the satellite forum 'Agudah Ahat,' whose purpose is to clarify more practical questions as well)—the answers are mainly sociological. 'That is where we grew up,' 'that is our language,' 'that is where our families and our friends are.' They are not interested in giving all that up. This has no connection to substantive worldviews regarding the state, or education, or all the other parameters that we are so accustomed to treating as sociological-ideological indicators. The people there do not see themselves as part of Religious Zionist society. Sometimes this is because of stereotypes, but for most of them that is not the reason (especially after the acquaintances that are opened to them on the forum). This is a sociological identity they do not want to give up. They want to repair the Haredi world from within, even though that repair would to a large extent turn it into something non-Haredi (in almost every objective sense).

In fact, in all the accepted senses, many of the forum's Haredi participants (sociologically speaking) hold nationalist and modern worldviews, at times even extreme ones. Some support the state with all their heart, and some see in it the realization of longings and the fulfillment of the vision of the prophets. They feel gratitude toward the army and toward modern medicine, and see in them an important value, just as they do in sharing the burden generally. Paying taxes is an elementary duty of every decent person, and tax evasion is seen by many of them as corrupt. Going out to work is an obligation, and certainly a legitimate way of life. The same is true of education. I believe some of them recite Hallel on Independence Day, either alone or in some distant prayer quorum (they dress in black, go to some distant place, and do what their hearts desire). Ideas according to which the Sages never erred scientifically seem to everyone utterly foolish, and they reject them with contempt. Regarding 'da'at Torah' (the doctrine of all-encompassing rabbinic authority), or 'Orthodoxy,' you will hear quotations from the studies of Jacob Katz and his colleagues about the novelty and distortion involved in this phenomenon. There is almost no trust there in the Haredi leadership, which is seen as the root of all evil. Haredi beliefs, institutions, and leaders are met there with torrents of contempt.

And despite all this, they do not see themselves as moving to live as Religious Zionists. This is a fascinating phenomenon sociologically, psychologically, and ideologically, and for someone like me, who tends toward rationality and ideological consistency, it is very hard to understand.

This brings me to the school known there as 'IAS'—'It's All Sociology' (the Yiddish is slang, used with humor that is fully conscious of the contrast between using an old language and espousing a modern and innovative approach), which attributes all worldviews and disputes to sociological motives and tendencies. This school has supporters on the forum, but there are also those who oppose it sharply (like me, for example). In a certain sense, the claims brought above are nothing but an implementation of this school's assumption—we are Haredi only in the sociological sense (and in the view of some of them there is no other, essential Haredi identity).

A Case in Point

This case concerns one of the forum's important participants, who is considered there an authority in almost every field of knowledge and thought. He possesses phenomenal knowledge in many areas and an original, systematic, and deep mind. On the forum he expresses himself, and is perceived, as an older and experienced person with several academic degrees in various and diverse fields. In addition, he is also a Torah scholar with impressive Torah knowledge. At first I assumed he was a Haredi living in the United States, who had studied and worked there. Once a personal connection arose between us, and we even met in the 'real' world, he told me about his daughters, aged two or three, and it became clear to me that this was a twenty-four-year-old kollel scholar living in the Old Yishuv in Jerusalem. He told me that from the age of seven he had been reading various books (including professional literature in English in mathematics and physics, in the life sciences, and in the social sciences and humanities), but he had no formal education whatsoever. His speech was in an accent typical of residents of the Old Yishuv, whereas his writing, which until then I had known, was modern and made abundant use of professional and foreign terminology.

I asked him why he was not pursuing formal studies and writing articles in his areas of interest, and he answered that he had no way to do so. He did not know the procedures and could not be admitted to academic studies because, formally speaking, he had not finished second grade. After looking into the matter, we succeeded (with the help of friends) in getting him into the university, and he is naturally finishing with honors. Today he continues his studies, and I assume we will hear much more about him. I do not know anyone with self-learning abilities and powers of understanding like his.

On the other hand, although he knew the latest slang on the streets of New York and all the rules of political correctness, he did not even know where some of the major Haredi yeshivot in Jerusalem were located. This is a result of the fact that all his knowledge was gathered from books and from the Internet, while he had no acquaintance at all with the 'real' world.

I cannot tell about his background and pedigree, for obvious reasons, but if these details become known they will certainly arouse astonishment in many people.

 

A Few Preliminary Conclusions

The assumption that the Internet is harmful and that its use should be minimized is correct in many contexts. On the other hand, Haredi society's fear of this forum is not justified. Ironically, this forum is one of the pillars on which Haredi society rests today. Without this opening through which one can examine viewpoints, clarify issues, and receive critical feedback from the diverse participants there, I estimate that many in Haredi society would have abandoned observance, or at least sought alternative communities. Many young people walk around with difficult problems of faith and worldview (and who does not have such problems?), and the upright and intelligent among them are no longer willing to buy the lines their teachers sell them. The heads of yeshivot and the spiritual supervisors, almost without exception, are unable to deal with the problems their students raise, and so they choose the simple expedient: they forbid them even to raise those problems. The students, almost without exception, understand this very well, and a dangerous contempt for rabbinic leadership develops. Many young men and kollel scholars relate to their rosh yeshiva as though he were an automaton for producing Ketzot-style explanations, incapable of thinking straightforwardly about principled questions in other contexts. In our time, young people are no longer willing to see Ketzot as the be-all and end-all, the foundation of faith, of thought, of one's relation to life, and not even of Torah and God.

I can testify that even while I was in Yeruham, dozens of young men and kollel scholars would come to me (physically, and even more by telephone) from the center of the country, troubled by various questions. Strikingly, these were not students from the more open yeshivot, where I would have expected some engagement with philosophical questions. These were specifically from closed Haredi and Religious Zionist yeshivot, where there was no real possibility of clarifying problems of faith and worldview (from the philosophical plane to questions of faith in the Sages and the meaning of our tradition).

True, I did not have answers to everything, but it seems to me that at least they felt they had found a listening ear, and that these matters could be raised, clarified, and faced without panic. The first thing I made a point of disproving at every such meeting was the corrupt and distorted education according to which faith must be one hundred percent. This strange and baseless assumption leads many of them to feel that they are hidden heretics, and to pangs of conscience over the fact that they are not being honest insofar as they still study Torah or belong to their communities, and much more could be said about this important point. The second thing I made clear was that ideas should not be tested by the question whether they are 'heresy' or not, but by the question whether they are true or not. What is true is not heresy, and what is not true should be rejected even if there is nothing heretical in it. Therefore this labeling category of 'heresy' and 'unbelief' is unnecessary and harmful. At least tactically one should know that for many people this no longer really works today (and in my personal opinion, that is a good thing).

Ironically, it turns out that the forum is the place that fulfills all these roles. It is what now guards the Torah and Haredi walls. There each person can raise his distress, find friends and advisers, seek criticism and guidance, without fear that his marriage prospects, livelihood, or children will be harmed, and without fear of being labeled in a way that will burden him for the rest of his life. In the forum an effort is made to salvage a little of the honor of those who sometimes are not truly worthy of such honor, by showing a person that even important people are not supposed to know everything, and by teaching our tongues to say, 'I do not know.' Surprisingly, the forum gives some of its members the option of being a rationally observant Jew without being (or feeling) stupid, and without ignoring his own difficulties and those of others.

To be sure, there is a real concern that participation in such discourse will lead to the adoption of problematic and innovative views, perhaps also harmful and mistaken ones, but the alternative is not rejection and labeling. That helps in no way at all. The only way to cope is through everyone's participation in the new discourse that is currently being conducted under the tables (I mean here mainly the Haredi world, but not only it), with a willingness to speak as equals, with evidence and reasons rather than from arbitrary authority, and also not from labels of 'heresy' and the like. Only in this way can one truly understand the problems and try to formulate real solutions to them rather than slogans that have long since gone stale.

Arachim-style methods of coping (that the Sages knew everything and never erred, that science perfectly accords with the tradition in our hands, and that everyone else is mistaken and misleading, wicked, or stupid, and the like) and other superficial preaching do not truly help someone who is genuinely troubled by these problems and invests time and energy in them. In my experience, these techniques are useful mainly for an audience that is already convinced, and they solve no real problem whatsoever (I am speaking at the moment mainly inward, to the Haredi world, and not outward). Is there anyone capable of dealing with a kollel scholar like the one I described in the example above by means of these techniques? Where would he even be today had he not participated in the forum?

Perhaps if our rabbis had acted this way during the Enlightenment period, instead of rejecting automatically and labeling, our current situation would look different. Today, as in the era of the Enlightenment, the Haredi world (and part of the Religious Zionist world), in its policy of ignoring and labeling, presents young people with an impossible choice: to be an honest and courageous heretic, or an observant person who is foolish, fearful, conservative, and naive. The option of grappling with the questions, offering answers, or even saying 'I do not know' when necessary and acknowledging their existence, does not really exist. This fig leaf of supposedly absolute knowledge no longer convinces anyone. I emphasize that there is no accusation in my words here, only a call to learn from the failures of the past.

In a traditional world there is a widespread feeling that openness is dangerous. But it is becoming clearer and clearer to me that insularity is no less dangerous, especially today, when it is not really possible to keep people enclosed within one bubble or another. It seems to me that one should reconsider the attitude toward such a forum, and also the policy of insularity and the general manner of coping with problems and questions.

[1] There is a Wikipedia entry for 'Stop Here, Think,' although some of the details there are inaccurate (since the writers rely mainly on publicly available information). One can also find there references to articles in the press.

[2] True, some of their leaders (they too are not gray-bearded figures) temper this with an ideology of preserving customs and traditions, but the reasoning is usually that these are intermediate stages that are important to preserve until rationality wins and the truth comes to light, and the ignorant masses understand that there is no need for all these things.